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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27966182">arms tonite</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/unlshthfrckngbts/pseuds/unlshthfrckngbts'>unlshthfrckngbts</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dorohedoro</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Canon, Starting Over, not super heavy on the romance in this one srry, risu's got some trauma but who doesn't</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 15:01:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,789</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27966182</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/unlshthfrckngbts/pseuds/unlshthfrckngbts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaiman’s shoulders might be wider and he might be taller, but Risu knows those hands, for better <i>and</i> for worse.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aikawa/Risu (Dorohedoro), Kaiman &amp; Risu (Dorohedoro), Kaiman/Risu (Dorohedoro)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>arms tonite</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>because my brain decided that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lv1K0H_4mfw&amp;ab_channel=MotherMother-Topic">"arms tonite" by mother mother</a> is a risukawa song</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When a door appears in the middle of the Hungry Bug on a Friday night after closing, neither Kaiman nor Nikaido give it a second glance anymore. It swings open with trails of smoke coiling around its floating frame, and a cheerful Asu jumps out with Risu in tow.</p><p>“Nikaido!” Asu calls, dumping a case of beer down on the bar and leaning over the sticky vinyl to peer back into the kitchen pantry space. “I hope you haven’t started without me! I thought we agreed this was our bonding thing!”</p><p>“She hasn’t started yet,” Kaiman whines from a nearby booth where he’s slumped over with a rag and bottle of cleaning spray sitting nearby. His chin rests on the edge of the table, and his head moves in a comical, overexaggerated manner when he speaks. “You guys are so <em> late </em> though! I’m starving!”</p><p>Risu rips open the beer, grabs two cans, and goes to sit across from Kaiman while Asu practically vaults the bar. He wordlessly slides one of the cans over to Kaiman, who sighs in appreciation and sits up to pop the tab and sloppily chug the entire thing in one go. Risu opens his own can as well, but he prefers not to be quite such an <em> animal </em> when he drinks, thank you.</p><p>“How was this week?” Kaiman asks, placing the empty can off to the side. He sits forward to lean an elbow on the table and rest his scaly chin in his hand. “Is Asu getting to be any more bearable?”</p><p>Risu snorts and nearly chokes on his beer in the process. The sound of laughter spills out of the pantry over the sound of clanging metal. “He’s still harassing me about whether or not I can <em> actually </em>make it through the exam. And I think his devil traits are becoming stronger again—I found him cooking steak in the middle of the night on Wednesday.”</p><p>“I’d do the same if the craving hit,” Kaiman admits as Asu and Nikaido walk out into the kitchen space behind the bar, arms full of ingredients and bowls. The mere promise of food has Kaiman shooting up from the booth to move to the bar where he can sit and beg for scraps like a puppy, leaving Risu to himself.</p><p>He stares out a window across the restaurant’s interior, trying to make out anything in the nighttime dark of Hole outside. He and Asu have made a habit of visiting over the last couple months—and not just after hours, either—but Risu still feels the unease of Hole lurking, never truly accustomed to. It’s certainly closer to his neighborhood of the Magic Users’ world than anything he experienced during his stint as En’s personal robotics project, but the threatening atmosphere remains.</p><p>It probably doesn’t help either that no matter how many times Kaiman enthusiastically gives him a tour of the place, Risu still wouldn’t bet on his ability not to get lost, especially in the dark.</p><p>Risu sips his beer and frowns to himself, chancing a side glance at Kaiman’s back. The weather has been consistently cold lately so he’s wearing that damn black sweatshirt more than usual these days, which only deepens Risu’s frown as he turns his head back to the discarded cleaning supplies on the table. He thinks back to his first time in Hole—<em> his </em>, not Curse’s—and how poorly that went, how he’d run out into the night alone in his distress and gotten cocky enough to take out his confusion and frustrations on some asshole passerby. He hadn’t wanted to think Aikawa had killed him back then, and he still doesn’t want to think so now, even after everything.</p><p>Asu laughs loud and unrestrained at something, and Risu physically jolts out of his thoughts. When he looks over, Kaiman is chugging a beer in a likely attempt to cool off his mouth from what Risu can only assume was something stolen out of the pan in front of Nikaido, who’s giving him a chastising glare that’s only a quarter serious and heavily downplayed by the corner of her mouth tugging up. Kaiman slams the beer can on the bar and points a threatening finger at Asu, who continues to laugh, mimicking Kaiman’s shock at the hot food.</p><p>“Risu,” Nikaido calls, peeking around Kaiman’s hulking form. “Can you restrain this one? It’ll be ages before we eat if he keeps stealing all the food.”</p><p>“You make it sound like I’m a dog!” Kaiman protests.</p><p>Nikaido turns to him and smiles with her head tilted, and Risu’s momentarily reminded of her mid-stage devil form and shivers. “You’re acting like one.”</p><p>“I’m not a dog!”</p><p>“That’s right” Asu says, leaning forward from where Risu can now see he’s been chopping something. “Dogs can be taught commands. You’re a worthless lizard; don’t you have a rock to go lay on or something?”</p><p>Risu tries to hide his laugh in a cough, but Kaiman still whips his head around to glare at him before turning back to grumble something in Asu’s direction. He grabs the case of beer, slides off his stool dramatically, and stomps over to join Risu in the booth again.</p><p>“It’s nice to not be the one on the other side of that for once,” Risu says casually, hiding a grin behind the lip of his can as the other man tosses the cleaning bottle and rag to a neighboring booth and drops the case in their place.</p><p>“Fuck you,” Kaiman grouses, slouching back into the seat across from him. “I’m not a lizard.”</p><p>Risu stares at him blankly.</p><p>“I’m not a <em> full </em> lizard!”</p><p>“You’re not a <em> worthless </em> lizard,” Risu concludes. He stares down at Kaiman’s hands, fingers thrumming against the tabletop. Frowns. “Or a full lizard.”</p><p>“See!” Kaiman yells in the direction of the bar, an arm outstretched to motion towards Risu like <em> see, someone gets it </em>. Nikaido smiles while she plates the food, but Asu ignores him entirely in a way he knows will rile Kaiman up further.</p><p>“Enough lizard talk, boys,” Nikaido says, making her way to the table with two steaming platters and Asu following behind with plates. Kaiman eagerly stows the beer case under the table to make space, and Risu nearly sighs in relief when Nikaido slides into the booth next to him. “It’s gyoza time.”</p><p>“Real lizards can’t talk anyways,” Kaiman says, snatching a set of chopsticks from Asu when he sits next to him. “Hope one of these platters is just for me, because I’m <em> starving </em>!”</p><p>Asu shuffles a plate to everyone, making sure to save Kaiman for last as if it’d make a difference. “Sounds like something an animal would say.”</p><p>Nikaido grips her beer can hard enough to dent it, and the three men jump at the sound. She smiles, equal parts amused and threatening. “Gyoza time.”</p><p>Risu’s shocked into a laugh, and Kaiman grins across the table at him. “Don’t gotta tell me again!”</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>“Why do they act like this?” Nikaido asks, three beers in and with her head slumped against Risu’s shoulder.</p><p>“Dunno,” Risu says, his own head leaned to the side to rest on top of hers. “I think it’s just Asu’s temperament.”</p><p>“He was never like this with me, though.”</p><p>“Yeah, because he cares about you. You should see the shit he puts me through at home.”</p><p>Nikaido squints at where Asu has locked Kaiman out of the Hungry Bug and taunts him from the other side of the glass, all over Kaiman’s refusal to do dishes. “He cares about you and Kaiman too.”</p><p>Kaiman looks about ready to bodily slam himself through the window to get back inside, his shivering illuminated only by the restaurant’s flickering neon sign above him. Risu knows where his stubbornness comes from. “Maybe.”</p><p>“Asu, come on, let him inside,” Nikaido calls. “It’s cold out and he doesn’t even have his jacket.”</p><p>“Nikaido, you shouldn’t have to do dishes,” Asu says, finally unlocking the door and smoothly stepping aside when Kaiman flings the door open and rushes in. “You’ve been working all day.”</p><p>“So have I!” Kaiman protests, stomping as far into the restaurant as he can to get away from the door and warm up. “Who do you think does the dishes all day!”</p><p>“I already said I would do the dishes,” Risu groans. “It’s just dishes.”</p><p>“I don’t want to wait around for you to finish, though,” Asu says, returning to the booth. “<em> Someone </em> still needs a door chauffeur, but it’s late and I’m tired.”</p><p>Risu doesn’t even have it in him to bristle at the remark. “Just leave me here in Hole for the night then. I can crash here.”</p><p>Asu looks to Nikaido, almost as if for permission. When she shows no signs of protest at the idea, he sighs. “You’d better not cause any issues.”</p><p>“You worry too much, Asu,” Nikaido says. “It’s never any trouble when either of you want to stay in Hole.”</p><p>Asu still looks apprehensive, but he doesn’t fight it any further. “Alright. I’ll come get you tomorrow.”</p><p>Goodbyes are exchanged and Asu summons his door, giving one final tired and empty threat in the same sentence as a goodnight wish before it closes behind him and dissipates into wisps of smoke. Risu gathers up the dirtied plates and places them next to the bowls and pans near the sink while Kaiman surprisingly takes to wiping down the booth they’d sat at for the night.</p><p>Nikaido tries to help in the cleanup, but the two men create a blockade to the kitchen with their giant statures and insist she go to bed while they clean and close up. She caves quickly, reminding Kaiman to lock the door when they leave with a yawn and giving both of them a kiss on the cheek goodnight—only managed by violently yanking them down to her level by the front of their shirts—before retreating to her apartment upstairs.</p><p>In the end, Kaiman actually does help with the dishes once he’s wiped down everything else, much like Risu had expected he would. With his help, they get everything scrubbed and put away in no time, and an unsaid offer has Risu standing outside the Hungry Bug in the dark of Hole with Kaiman as he locks the door.</p><p>The walk to Kaiman’s place feels longer than it is due to the cold, but they keep a brisk pace and Risu manages to convince Kaiman that they don’t <em> really </em> need to stop at the alley for shits and giggles and “old time’s sake.” They approach Kaiman’s house and Risu nearly slips on black ice climbing the stairs, but Kaiman quickly reaches out to stabilize him before he can fall. Risu only feels a little bad about laughing at him for fumbling with his key in the dark moments later.</p><p>“Did’ya wanna shower?” Kaiman asks once they’ve entered the house and closed out the chill, shedding his layers and gloves to be tossed on a kitchen chair. “Like how you used to take em to warm up.”</p><p>Risu feels faded memories turn over in the back of his brain as he stands there still bundled in his coat in Kaiman’s kitchen, years-old moments and details from what feels like a different life and with a different person, but maybe not fully. He wants to acknowledge the fact that Kaiman remembers this detail—or even knows it at all—but he just nods and slowly begins to reluctantly unzip his jacket.</p><p>Kaiman offers him a messily folded set of clean clothes, jokingly threatens him to be quick and save some hot water for himself, and returns to the kitchen to do who knows what. Eat some more? After all they’d already eaten? Risu wouldn’t be surprised, in this life or another, with Kaiman or somebody else.</p><p>This isn’t the first night Risu has spent in Hole or even spent at Kaiman’s. He stares at a chip in the ceramic tile of the floor as he stands under the hot water and thaws, warmth finally returning to his fingers and toes. Something feels different tonight, and he turns off the shower with a little more force than necessary.</p><p>He finds Kaiman still in the kitchen, puttering around the cupboards with his back to the hall where Risu stands and humming something under his breath. Not for the first time that night, Risu stares at his back, and something like unease crawls into his chest and seizes.</p><p>Kaiman’s shoulders are wider, stretch his t-shirt tauter. He’s taller, too, and Risu loathes it with an energy he’s not sure the origin of, but mere inches suddenly somehow manage to make him feel small. His arms—</p><p>“Oh, fuck!” Kaiman says, jumping when he catches sight of Risu out of the corner of his eye and spinning around to face him. He looks properly scandalized with a hand clutched close to his chest. “Why’re you just standing there?”</p><p>Risu shrugs. “You seemed busy.”</p><p>“Admiring the view, were you?” Kaiman asks, cocking his hip and flexing a bicep. Risu was <em> not </em>. He wasn’t. But Kaiman points at him. “Warm now?”</p><p>“Warm now.”</p><p>While Kaiman takes his own turn in the shower, Risu sits on his shitty couch in the living room wearing what he knows Asu would tease him as being his “brooding face.” It’s late and he’s tired, but something swirls in his gut as he listens to the wind rattle a nearby windowpane. He looks over to where Kaiman had tossed his sweatshirt in the kitchen and feels something akin to grief, but even that doesn’t feel right.</p><p>A hand lands on his shoulder from behind and Risu leaps off of the couch to spin around and into a defensive position, reflexively reaching for stakes he hasn’t worn in a month only to curl fingers into empty air at his chest.</p><p>Kaiman, for his part, seems to acknowledge his mistake quickly and takes a step backwards, hands up in a nonthreatening signal. “Sorry, sorry. I probably shouldn’t have done that,” he says with the gall to sound sheepish. Risu hadn’t even heard the shower turn off, but Kaiman stares at him in an outfit similar to his own borrowed clothes. “Are you okay?”</p><p>“I’m fine,” Risu grits.</p><p>“You’re not.”</p><p>“What does it matter to you?” Risu snaps. He knows it’s a low blow, and he regrets it almost immediately after it leaves his mouth. He looks away and puts a hand to his head. “I’m just tired.”</p><p>“Oh, nuh-uh,” Kaiman says, rounding the couch and plopping down with crossed arms. The frame creaks under his sudden weight, but he nods to the empty space next to him. “Something’s up and we’re gonna talk about it.”</p><p>“You can’t be serious—”</p><p>Kaiman stares up at him in a way that says he is serious, and very much so. Risu clenches his jaw and begrudgingly acknowledges this as another divergence.</p><p>Aikawa never would have pressed an issue like this. Not unless Risu was in mortal danger. For all that he worried about Risu and his safety, talking about problems and feelings was something he’d usually preferred to laugh off instead whenever possible.</p><p>He had been spectacular at avoiding things, hadn’t he.</p><p>Risu sits on the edge of the couch, hating his hyperawareness of the door in case this goes sour. He should talk about this. He <em> needs </em> to.</p><p>“Is this about my face?” Kaiman asks.</p><p>Risu could throttle him. Self-absorbed bastard. “Not everything is about your face!” he says, holding himself back from a shriek. He needs to stay calm. “Why is that <em> always </em> your question?”</p><p>Kaiman, on the other hand, looks about as laid back as usual, though his arms are still crossed. “Because it’s you.”</p><p>Risu just stares at him, face split into thirds of disbelief, confusion, and frustration. “What does <em> that </em> mean?”</p><p>“It means,” Kaiman says, leaning forward to jab a finger into Risu’s sternum, “that you’re still comparing me to somebody else.”</p><p>Risu goes rigid, both at the contact and the words. He doesn’t like the way Kaiman phased that, doesn’t like its implications even if it’s nothing but the truth. He also doesn’t want to roll over so easily and admit that he’s hit the bullseye on his first arrow, but he can see in Kaiman’s eyes that he already knows. He pushes the finger away from his chest. “It’s not your face.”</p><p>“Then tell me what it is,” Kaiman huffs. He sounds annoyed, but not more than he is concerned. Risu supposes he can’t blame him.</p><p>He isn’t sure how to even approach this or organize his feelings in a way that he would be able to communicate. His eyes slide over to where Kaiman taps a finger on his knee, and Risu recognizes it as a fidget Aikawa’d done while trying to pay attention in class. But with a sudden realization, Risu’s blood goes cold and he feels his throat constrict.</p><p>Kaiman and Aikawa are different. They’re different people with different thoughts and feelings and physiques, mostly. Risu knows this, deep down, whether or not he can admit it. But the longer he stares at Kaiman’s hand, the more he feels like he recognizes it, almost from a different life himself.</p><p>Kaiman’s shoulders might be wider and he might be taller, but Risu knows those hands, for better <em> and </em> for worse.</p><p>“Kaiman,” Risu says slowly. He feels stupid. He feels stupid for feeling like this and for what he’s about to ask. “How much do you remember?”</p><p>“Huh?”</p><p>He’s an idiot. This was a bad idea. Why would he expect him to understand? Who’s to say Kaiman will even want to talk about this?</p><p>“Oh,” Kaiman says then, cutting Risu off from his agonized internal panic. “Do you mean like...from them? The other heads?”</p><p>Risu nods.</p><p>Kaiman looks thoughtful, like he’s considering it for the first time. “Hmm...it’s kind of weird because I guess in the past, we were all the same? Different, but the same body at least. But according to Nikaido, this me came from my old head, so I have no clue how that all works. But I still…” He pauses, tilts his head a little, squints. “I remember some stuff.”</p><p>“Like?”</p><p>“Most of it is from Ai, I think,” Kaiman says. “Since he’s like...who I really am, or whatever. Or he’s the starting point. Yeah, that sounds better. I remember some stuff from the Cross-Eyes boss, too, or Hole or whatever, but nothing really clear. It’s all really muddy? And chaotic.” Kaiman looks uncomfortable now. “I remember you.”</p><p>“You remember me,” Risu says, and he feels an anxiety in his chest. He knows what Kaiman is talking about, but he almost wants him to still say it, put it out there.</p><p>Kaiman does. “It’s not...detailed or clear, but I remember the blood.”</p><p>“You killed me.”</p><p>“<em> I </em> didn’t kill you!” Kaiman protests. “It wasn’t me, Kaiman, who killed you. But I have his memory of that day, and the way Curse activated and followed him to Hole. He killed you, but you killed him back.”</p><p>Risu laughs, and it feels bitter. “Not really. He killed me and I was dead. I didn’t do anything. And Curse didn’t kill the boss, just...turned him into you and trapped itself inside your mouth or whatever.” He doesn’t feel any better about this, though. This isn’t what he wanted. “Is that all?”</p><p>“No,” Kaiman says. “I remember you again. Differently.”</p><p>Risu doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t think he’d even be able to even if he knew what to say at all.</p><p>Kaiman clears his throat. “I uh...I do have some of Aikawa’s memories.”</p><p>He knows this is more of what he was asking for, but now Risu isn’t even sure he wants to know anymore. Maybe it’s better off to just avoid it, like Aikawa would. Maybe this knowing will only make things worse.</p><p>“I remember that we were partners,” Kaiman says. Risu wants to ignore the way he speaks differently on Aikawa’s memories than Kai’s. He doesn’t want to think about what that means, because he knows it isn’t what he wants it to mean. “And I know that because you told me. And that you’re upset about it. And you want to become a devil to change my face back, because Nikaido said that when that girl’s magic wore off, I was Aikawa.”</p><p>“But you’re not Aikawa,” Risu says, staring at his own hands in his lap, clenched into fists. “You’re not Aikawa, and like I said, it’s <em> not </em> always about your face.”</p><p>Kaiman huffs. “You’re right, I’m not Aikawa. But I kinda was!”</p><p>“But I <em> killed </em> Aikawa.”</p><p>The moment Risu says it, he feels like everything gets punched out of him. That day and the weeks leading up to it had been a whirlwind of confusion and desperation, but he still remembers the weight of Store’s kitchen knife in his hand, the feeling of it cutting through the air and flesh and bone. He still sees Aikawa’s—or it was Ai’s, technically, wasn’t it?—head rising from the depths of that bloated monster just to sail through the air to the ground after a swing of that knife behind his eyelids at night, still hears his voice ringing in his ears.</p><p>
  <em> Risu, hurry up and kill me. Put an end to your curse. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I should be killed by you, Risu. I want to be killed by you. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Go ahead. Don’t hesitate. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I just want it to end. All of it. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Goodbye. </em>
</p><p>“I killed him,” Risu says. “Aikawa is dead because I killed him.”</p><p>Kaiman looks unsure of how to proceed with this conversation, and Risu just feels worse. He’d been bothered by this since it’d happened—how cruel to finally see Aikawa after being dead for two years just to have him die shortly after, and to be his killer at that—but he hadn’t had time to properly grieve or sit with the loss. Everything had come to a head—ha—and then been dealt with so fast, and then immediately afterwards he’d jumped right into spending every waking moment studying and learning with Asu to prepare for his training and the devil exam. He’d lost his partner and all he had to show for it were the nightmares.</p><p>Except maybe he hadn’t fully lost him, because Kaiman was still here and Kaiman was still tied to Aikawa, at least to some miniscule degree. And maybe that was a problem. Maybe Risu had clung to the thought that maybe Aikawa was still alive inside that big lizard head somewhere, and that if he just tried hard enough or did something right, he would come back and things would be like they used to be.</p><p>But Risu knows this isn’t true and won’t happen, even through the delusional wishing and hoping. He knows Kaiman is his own person, this Kaiman especially—whatever that means.</p><p>And Aikawa is dead.</p><p>“He really cared about you, Risu,” Kaiman says, and his voice is rougher than usual, like it’s hard to say. “You did what you had to do, and you helped us get closer to defeating that thing. It’s what he wanted. It’s what he <em> needed </em>.”</p><p>“I never...knew.” He never really knew anything, in the end. Even right up until the end, when he’d tried to explain everything from the beginning, Risu had felt lost and confused and hurt. “He never told me anything.”</p><p>“He wanted to protect you.”</p><p>Risu feels bitter. He wants to trust in Aikawa, wants to believe that so badly if for nothing else than his own desire to be valued and cared enough about to be worth protecting, but it still stings. It didn’t even work in the end. Not really. He’d still gotten killed, even if he <em> had </em> managed some massive fucking luck to be brought back. Everything they’d both done had just been for nothing.</p><p>“Do I make things worse?” Kaiman asks, and when Risu looks up, he sees him pointing a finger towards himself. “Like, does me being-him-but-not-really make this harder for you?”</p><p>“I don’t know.” He doesn’t want to hurt Kaiman’s feelings. It’s not his fault. It’s not like he knows how to fix this either.</p><p>“I’m gonna say it’s a yes,” Kaiman declares. “So then that brings us to the next question! What do you want from me? Or need from me?”</p><p>Risu stares at him like he’s grown another head, which he supposes actually wouldn’t be so strange considering Kaiman owns a small collection of <em> been there, done that </em> t-shirts for <em> actually </em> growing another head.</p><p>Kaiman scratches the back of his neck, below the spines. “Like, is there anything I can do to make this situation better?”</p><p>The clock on the stove in the kitchen glares an aggressive reminder of how late it is, and Risu absentmindedly wonders if the hour and long digested—and no longer potent; he’s making excuses and he knows it—beer in his stomach from earlier didn’t help open this. He hadn’t intended to sour the night with this conversation.</p><p>Is there anything Kaiman could do? He doesn’t think so. He says as much, but Kaiman still looks at him like he’s searching for something to do, anything to decipher.</p><p>Kaiman shifts on the couch. “Do you...want me to go?”</p><p>“This is your house?”</p><p>“I didn’t mean <em> literally </em>,” Kaiman says. “I meant would it be easier for you if we weren’t. Y’know. Friends. Whatever.”</p><p>Risu isn’t sure what kind of <em> friends </em> are the kind of, sort of reincarnation-but-that’s-not-right of former partners and also murderers, but the idea of losing Kaiman lights a panic in him. “No.”</p><p>They sit in silence while Risu mulls things over, takes inventory of his body and his feelings. He feels heavy, both physically and emotionally. He’s tired. It feels like the last couple months have suddenly crawled up onto his shoulders and rested their weight down his chest.</p><p>Maybe he really should’ve given himself the chance to process this earlier. Maybe he’s been spectacular at avoiding things too.</p><p>“I think,” Risu says, folding his fingers into wrinkles of borrowed sweats and forcing himself to meet Kaiman’s eyes, “that I just need time. To accept it. Everything. That Aikawa is gone, even if the two of you overlap.” He frowns. “And that you killed me.”</p><p>“<em> Not me </em> !” Kaiman nearly hollers. Risu wants to laugh at the desperation to prove himself, but something still remains burrowed deep within him, something that pulsates equal parts rage and fear. He’d mostly come to terms with his death, considering he was here alive now in spite of the fact. He also <em> knows </em> it wasn’t Kaiman, doesn’t knowingly or intentionally hold it against him. But he’d be lying if he said he felt at all comfortable when Kaiman stood behind him.</p><p>“But,” Kaiman says, “I guess it’s all kind of the same, actually.” He looks ashamed, almost. Risu decides he doesn’t like it. “He was part of that shitshow too. I gotta take the bad too if I’m gonna take the good. I can’t blame you for it.”</p><p>“For what it’s worth, I know it wasn’t you,” Risu says, leaning to rest his face against the back of the couch. “It’s just...another thing to get used to. To accept.”</p><p>Kaiman nods, leans a little himself. “You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”</p><p>Risu stares at the large snout across from him, chewing the inside of his cheek and trying to decide how much he wants to risk embarrassing himself. “I do want to get to know <em> you </em> better, though. As Kaiman. Not as Aikawa. Or anyone else, for that matter. Just…slowly.”</p><p>“I can do slow.”</p><p>Risu positively doubts that, but he doesn’t say it considering Kaiman isn’t calling him out for asking for slow now despite having spent pretty much every one of his occasional overnights in Hole crammed into Kaiman’s bed. It’s an adjustment, a tweaking.</p><p>He twists to sit on the couch properly and lets his head fall back to stare at the ceiling. “I guess we kind of killed each other, in a way.”</p><p>“Guess so,” Kaiman says. “Pure romance, huh.”</p><p>Risu lets himself laugh at that, and he looks over to see Kaiman smiling.</p><p>He spends that night squashed on Kaiman’s couch not meant to be used as a bed by a man his size—Kaiman <em> did </em> offer his bed when Risu mentioned wanting to sleep alone for the night, but Kaiman would fit even worse—but as the distant sounds of Hole send him to sleep, he hopes that maybe this doesn’t have to be so hard after all.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hmu on <a href="https://twitter.com/unlshthfrckngbt">twitter!</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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